Welcome to my blog. HIV prevalence is not a reliable indicator of sexual behavior because the virus is also transmitted through unsafe healthcare, unsafe cosmetic practices and various traditional practices. This is why many HIV interventions, most of which concentrate entirely on sexual behavior, have been so unsuccessful.

Thursday, June 15, 2017

Why would women in an African country fear being diagnosed HIV positive, refuse to take part in a treatment program that would keep them alive, and probably prevent them from infecting others? After all, the virus has been around for over 30 years and treatment has been available, free of charge, for more than a decade. We know how it can be spread, we just haven't agreed on which are the most dangerous modes of transmission. But a study has found that women believe their husbands and families will reject them, perhaps divorce, disinherit, physically attack or even kill them because of their status.

HIV has long been presented as being primarily sexually transmitted among heterosexuals, in African countries. People who are infected tend to be told that they were almost certainly infected by having sexual intercourse with a HIV positive person. However, many people who have tested positive have objected that they have not had sexual intercourse at all; or they know that the person (or people) they have had sex with are negative; or they took adequate precautions, etc.

In non-African countries, such as the US, the largest group of people infected with HIV are men who have sex with men. The next largest group is injecting drug users. Therefore, many would ask why heterosexual sex appears to be so much more risky in some African countries than it does in non-African countries. Prevalence among certain groups, such as young women in parts of South Africa, has approached 50%, even higher sometimes. Prevalence is over 20% in some southern African countries (although not in any non-African country).

UNAIDS, WHO, the US Centers for Disease Control (CDC) and other parties have tied themselves in knots trying to explain away the glaring racism implied in the claim that up to 85% of infections in African countries are a result of unsafe sex. When non-African people say that they could not have been infected through sexual intercourse, the matter can be investigated. Otherwise, their own statement of their risks is accepted, and they are not branded as some kind of sexual deviant.

I'll quote Catherine Hankins, formerly a senior officer at UNAIDS, expressing her views on 'African men': "Take a middle-class African businessman. He has had five women - nothing excessive. But the pattern we find is that he has a wife. He also has an on-off affair with an office colleague. He also has what the French call a 'deuxième bureau' - a mistress who might have a child. And once a year he goes back to his home village and has sex with his original village sweetheart. Then he gets HIV from a bar girl on a business trip."

Hankins and her fellow scientists may see this as a reasonable explanation for extraordinarily high rates of transmission, usually in relatively clearly delineated pockets, in high prevalence African countries. But if that's what 'African' men tend to be like, you might expect HIV prevalence to be relatively high in almost every 'African' country, in all cities, and in all densely populated areas. You could also be forgiven for wondering whether Hankins believes that all women are similarly 'promiscuous', or if they are mostly victims.

The reality is quite different: HIV prevalence is highest in a handful of southern African countries; next highest are parts of East African countries, such as the area around Lake Victoria and one of the southern districts in Tanzania; Nairobi, Kampala and a few others places were also hard hit by the pandemic (with low prevalence elsewhere); but in central African countries, even West Africa, prevalence is much lower, and in North Africa rates are lower than in many western countries.

In fact, prevalence is often high among wealthier people, employed people, people with access to better road infrastructure and better access to healthcare. 'Promiscuity' (perhaps not as rich as Hankins' scenario) occurs everywhere, not just in a handful of southern African countries, in cities or in diamond and gold mines. You could say it is fairly widely distributed, in Africa and elsewhere. Some people are 'promiscuous', but most are not. So unless you accept redneckery like Hankins' (which is something of an industry standard), HIV should also be much more evenly distributed, at least in African countries around where the virus seems to have emerged.

The patterns of HIV transmission suggest that there are additional modes of transmission aside from heterosexual sex. These may include unsafe healthcare, where skin piercing equipment is reused without sterilization, unsafe traditional practices that involve skin piercing, even unsafe cosmetic practices, such as ear and body piercing, tattooing, etc. But the patterns of transmission do not suggest levels of unsafe sexual behavior that would be beyond most people, in inclination, energy, even time.

So instead of asking why women are afraid to be diagnosed as HIV positive, or why 'African' men are angry (especially HIV negative ones), the international HIV community should ask how they have allowed themselves to be fooled by such tired old myths, such as those about 'African' sexuality or typical behavior of 'African' men. The HIV industry is still happy to test people and send them home, so they can tell their HIV negative husbands and partners that they have a sexually transmitted virus. They then have to persuade their family and community that they are not 'promiscuous'. If the HIV industry didn't believe them, why would their family or community?

The World Medical Association's Declaration of Lisbon on the rights of the Patient states that: "Every person has the right to health education that will assist him/her in making informed choices about personal health and about the available health services. The education should include information about healthy lifestyles and about methods of prevention and early detection of illnesses. The personal responsibility of everybody for his/her own health should be stressed. Physicians have an obligation to participate actively in educational efforts." Failing to inform people adequately means they take risks they needn't take, are stigmatized because of their HIV status and are much less likely to accept treatment that keeps them alive, and reduces the risk of infecting others.

Of course people are afraid and angry, they are being told lies about HIV, about the people closest to them, and about 'Africans' and their superhuman 'promiscuity'. UNAIDS, WHO and the rest know that heterosexual sex cannot account for levels of HIV in certain areas in Africa. So no more lies about concurrency, 'traditional' sexual practices, predominant 'mores', migratory patterns and the like. HIV can be transmitted through heterosexual sex, but it is much more easily spread through unsafe healthcare and other bloodborne modes of transmission. If people are not informed, they will continue to avoid diagnoses, life saving drug programs and anything else to do with HIV.